Machines having an engine system operate in a variety of environments. Such engines typically rely on some means for cooling to remove excess heat generated during operation. Accordingly, a typical machine with an engine includes a cooling package, such as a heat exchanger in the form of a radiator and a fan, to circulate at least air to cool the engine. Typically, the fan and radiator are used in combination with a cooling pump that circulates a liquid coolant, such as water or a water/antifreeze solution, between the radiator and internal channels within the engine to cool the engine. The engine and radiator combination can be mounted in a variety of mobile machines, such as highway trucks, off-highway trucks, excavators, tractors, motor graders, wheel loaders, scrapers and the like, operating in environments that include airborne dust and debris.
Such contaminants can cause problems and/or reduce operational efficiency when they infiltrate sealed areas. For example, accumulated debris between a seal and a system tank of a radiator can prevent the seal from adequately compressing during thermal cycling of components of the radiator. The restricted radiator component can experience increased mechanical loads that lead to early failure.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,267,881 is entitled, “Cooling System Filter,” and is directed to a cooling system filter used with a radiator associated with an internal combustion engine. The arrangement for filtering coolants used in internal combustion engines utilizes a panel filter disposed between a radiator core and an outlet header tank to trap particulates entrained in the coolant prior to returning the coolant to the engine. The panel filter has a pleated filter media surrounded by a gasket, which gasket seals between the outlet end of the radiator core and the outlet header tank.
It will be appreciated that this background description has been created by the inventors to aid the reader, and is not to be taken as an indication that any of the indicated problems were themselves appreciated in the art. While the described principles can, in some respects and embodiments, alleviate the problems inherent in other systems, it will be appreciated that the scope of the protected innovation is defined by the attached claims, and not by the ability of any disclosed feature to solve any specific problem noted herein.